Large Fierce Mammal

In my first year of university I shared what was supposed to be a double room with two other guys, the inimitable Michael Gilbert Baker, presently of Nova Scotia Government fame, and a Monctonian named Bruce Andrew Hudson. Bruce’s major was computer science but, in the thoughtless exuberance that so often characterizes the decisions of freshmen everywhere, he thought it would be a good idea to take an elective course in “Scientific German”. Fortunately for Bruce it was only a half course.

As part of his final exam, Bruce was required to write a brief composition to demonstrate his newfound competence. The subject: What I do when I get up in the morning.

I was sitting in our mutual room when Bruce triumphantly returned bearing his exam paper with its exemplary mark of 50% and an enigmatic red scrawl from his professor that read, “It’s been very entertaining Bruce. Good luck.” He immediately sat down at his desk and set to work with his trusty German-English dictionary saying, “I can’t wait to see what I wrote!”

As the minutes passed, the scratching of his pen was joined by soft snickers. Snickers became guffaws that soon escalated to hysterics. Finally, collapsed on his desk unable to speak, Bruce extended one arm in my direction bearing the translated document that described, in English, what he did when he got up in the morning:

“I get up and wake up the teeth and hair.
I jump for the face.
I brush the comb with the brush, then I comb and bend for school.
I breath the knee and the upper part of the body touches.”

Now that’s entertainment.